Page:Our Little Girl (1923).pdf/17



For three months Dorothy did not differ radically from any other baby-and then Mrs. Loamford decided that the child was a Reitz rather than a Loamford. After that, you might have persuaded Mrs. Loamford that the circumstances and the doctor and the nurse attending her daughter's birth were commonplace enough. Perhaps you might have convinced her that Dorothy was formed and nourished like other infants. But there your arguments would have ended.

If you had said that Dorothy was a sweet child, a well-behaved child or even a normal child, Mrs. Loamford would have laughed in a superior way - it was the only in which she could laugh—and produced a book with padded covers. This volume was the work of Mrs. Loamford. It was, as she used to observe, written with her own hands. The name of the work was "Darling's Diary," and it was punched in gold letters into the silky pillows which protected the leaves.

The first page was ordinary, although you might have had some difficulty in persuading Mrs. Loamford of that. It proclaimed the tidings that there had been born at 137 West 88th Street, New York City to Chas. Sam'l Loamford and Martha Reitz Loamford a daughter, Dorothy Reitz Loamford, weight at birth, 6½ lbs., and recorded the names of Dr. Knight and Miss Haviland, the medical officiaries. Near the bottom of the page the anonymous compiler of the manual had left a space for "Mother's [1]